GCGH Expands

LINTON, IND. (WTHI) - A rural southern Indiana hospital unveils plans for an expansion.

The Greene County General Hospital will be carrying out a $6.5 million building project.

The plan is targeted to expand services that are growing at the facility.

The Greene County General Hospital hasn't changed much physically since it was built in 1974 but that is all about to change.

Hospital officials joined together to announce plans for an 8,500 square foot expansion.

The first change will be a new covered entryway, but the biggest part of the work will be to double the size of the Emergency Room that serves as many as 10,000 patients a year.

"We've seen this in the last few years, an increase in the number of patients through the emergency room," said Director of Nursing Lea Ann Camp, "and it's continuing to rise." "We watch that all the time and expect that to continue to go up."

While the bulk of the expansion is going to concentrate on the emergency room, some other departments are also going to get bigger.

Those include radiology, pharmacy, the lab, and physical therapy.

"This is project that within the current existing walls we're going to rearrange our physical therapy a great deal as well as our pharmacy," said Director Jonas Uland.

Officials say they intend to carry out the project without raising taxes.

They say they have targeted areas that people use and are focusing on creating a better delivery of those services by improving the facilities.

"This is more a way of adapting," explained Uland. "It's a growth of sorts, but it's more adapting to where we're seeing health care go."

Officials say they have no plans for adding staff immediately, but they believe that as the hospital's facilities take on more patients more jobs could open in the future.

Hospital officials say they intend to break ground later this year and then have the work completed in 18 months.